


She Will Set Us Free

by Anart617



Category: Bendy and the Ink Machine
Genre: Allison is called Alice, Allison is sweet, Amnesia, Canon-Typical Violence, Henry is little bendy, Joey's a butt, Other, So is Bendy, Steve is Steve, but only for now, much confusion
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-02-02
Updated: 2020-02-06
Packaged: 2021-02-28 06:34:05
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 2
Words: 4,445
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22529416
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Anart617/pseuds/Anart617
Summary: When Audrey wakes up in the studio with no memories of anything other than her name, she decides to search for the answers. Along the way she makes allies and enemies, and more of the latter. But that changes when she discovers a power only she possesses: the power to change the script for the better, and to set everyone free.And give ol' Mister Drew a good kick in the face.
Relationships: Allison Angel/Tom
Comments: 1
Kudos: 13





	1. Amnesia

**Author's Note:**

> Okay, so I know Dark Revival hasn't been released and we know very little about it. But this story has been nagging at my brain and I couldn't ignore it, so here we are. Whenever the game comes out and dashes all my theories and ideas to little pieces, I don't care, I'll still keep writing it because heck, it's a fanfiction! It doesn't have to be canonically accurate. Regardless, hope you guys enjoy!

To call her current situation problematic would be…an understatement, to say the least. To clarify, she was trapped in a cage, attached to a chain that was wrapped around a hook jutting out from the ceiling. The cage was small, barely large enough to contain her, and it swung with every miniscule movement that she made. She didn’t exactly trust the material the chain was made out of, worried it may have rusted in more than one spot, and so she tried to keep perfectly still, but the damned thing moved anyway, despite her worrisome attempts.  
  
Another thing to note is that the floor was nonexistent, flooded by a lake of ink that spanned the entire length of the room. Dangling from the ceiling were similar cages to her own. Most were empty, but there was one that was occupied by an odd looking person. He seemed to be made of ink. She tried calling out to him earlier, but he ignored her. He didn’t even seem to hear her, as he didn’t react to her words, just stared blankly ahead with overlarge glowing eyes full of a deep sorrow. She pitied him, but not so much as she pitied herself. She was stuck in a pretty bad spot, after all.  
  
All of that was already difficult to manage, but on top of it was her apparent lack of memory; she couldn’t recall a thing before waking up in that infernal cage. Not a thing…except for a name. It seemed to whisper itself in the recesses of her mind, in a repetition that she couldn’t decide was more soothing than annoying, or the other way around.  
  
 _Audrey,_ it whispered. _Audrey, Audrey, Audrey…_  
  
She growled and pressed her fists against her temples, as though squeezing real hard would make the voice go away. It was already hard enough to think, with all of her memories gone and her thoughts jumbled up from the fear and confusion such amnesia ultimately breeds. But allowing herself to succumb wasn’t an option. She had to focus on finding a way out of her current predicament.  
  
At the far end of the room was a wooden platform, the railing of which was halfway crumbled to oblivion. The walls were made of rock, leading her to believe that she was stuck somewhere underground. What ink had to do with being underground she didn’t know. All she knew was the facts laid before her.  
  
Leading off of the platform was a door built into the rocky wall. It was closed, but that didn’t mean it was locked. There was no other exit from this room, other than falling into the ink below. Her stomach churned unpleasantly, looking down at it. It was like some deep gut feeling was telling her that touching the ink--any of it--would not be a smart idea.  
  
She carefully sat up, trying to ignore the way the cage swayed, and squinted her eyes at the door, then the platform. It wasn’t that far away. Perhaps, if she put enough momentum into it…  
  
Audrey glanced again at the ink below, and a gulp swelled in her throat. She swallowed it away just as quickly, shaking her head.  
  
“Snap out of it,” she scolded herself. “Getting out of here is more important than being afraid. It’ll be easy, like jumping off a tire swing.”  
  
It depressed her to think that she could imagine that analogy with full clarity but was unable to come up with a single dredge of memory. But again, now was not the time to dwell on such things. It was time to take action. Otherwise she would be stuck here forever.  
  
Gritting her teeth and coiling her muscles, Audrey scooted to the back of her cage. She counted to three, then flung herself forward. The cage jolted in the desired direction, following her momentum. Light stinging traced up her arms from the impact against the metal bars. It wasn’t enough, however. She needed more of an arc, more strength. She moved backwards again, waited for the cage to swing back, counting to three in her head.  
  
With a yell, she threw herself into the bars again. It was closer this time. Two more tries should do it. She glanced up at the chain. Just as she had suspected earlier, the chain was rusted. It looked decades old, and ready to snap at any moment. Perfect.  
  
Audrey rocked the cage twice more, getting closer to her goal with every swing. On the second swing she heard a loud crack. The chain had snapped; she knew it without looking up. She braced herself as the cage flew through the air. It crashed into the wall, then hit the wooden platform, knocking her all over.  
  
Audrey groaned, looking around. Every muscle ached, but she grinned, seeing she’d made it onto the platform and that the door to her cage had opened sometime during the crash. Her plan had worked.  
  
She crawled out and stood up, stretching out her legs and arms, wincing from the pain. Audrey wasn’t given much time to relax, however. The floor beneath her began to groan. From behind her, the wooden boards began to detach with alarming speed, falling through the air and landing with a splash in the ink far below.  
  
“Cr*p.”  
  
Without further hesitation, Audrey turned and dashed to the door, praying to who-or-what-she-didn’t-know that the door would be unlocked. Either luck was on her side or her prayer was answered, as the doorknob turned at her touch and the door swung wide open. She shut it closed with a loud snap, listening as the rest of the platform collapsed from the other side.  
  
Audrey tried not to think how close she came to death as she examined the hallway before her, determined to set her mind on other things–what was happening, and not the what-ifs that would never be. A feat that was easier said than done, but Audrey was quickly learning that she was a very determined person when she set herself a goal–and right now her goal was to learn where she was, who she was, and why her memories were wiped in the first place.  
  
Everything was sepia-toned: the walls, the floor, and the ceiling. It seemed to be more than the overhead lighting; the shades of color (or lack thereof) appeared almost…natural, but in the most unnatural way possible. Black ink stood out against this sad backdrop of toneless architecture; it dripped from the ceiling, collecting in pools on the floor; spots of it dabbled the walls. On the wall at the other end of the hallway was a handwritten message, and a handprint trailing down and away from it.  
  
 **LIAR.**  
  
The word sent chills shuddering through her. She didn’t know why the word hit her so strongly. Perhaps it was connected to something with her past. The only way to learn that, however, was to go forward. She set aside her unease, breathing in deeply and letting out a sharp exhale, before beginning her exploration.  
  
……  
  
More than an hour must have passed. Audrey had examined every room she passed, every room that wasn’t locked, that is. There were quite a lot of those, evidently. Why, she had no clue. But it frustrated her every time she would turn a doorknob only for her to discover it was locked, and there weren’t any keys she could find that could unlock them. Nor was there anything she could use to knock them down.  
  
Even in the rooms she could explore, there was little to be found. Most of them held nothing but expired cans of bacon soup. Thirty years expired. What sane person would leave old food like that lying around? she wondered. There were a few interesting things she'd found, however: audio recordings of people complaining about their boss and the company they worked for, which she assumed was this place. One such recording came from a young-sounding man. His loud, snarky voice blasted through the silence.  
  
 _"That machine! Sammy was right, that thing ain’t natural. The noises it makes, ah, I hate to admit it, but it’s been giving me nightmares. And lately, I feel like I’m being watched. Of course, that’s ridiculous. But I am worried about the machine. After Connor just up and quit Mr. Drew left me in charge of it, and at first I was real flattered. I mean, that’s the studio’s big project, the one Mr. Drew has been so eager about. And he left_ me _in charge of it! I could hardly believe my luck! But now, I’m worried that I’ve been overworking it. He’s been asking for a lot of ink lately, and in the past two weeks it’s been making those noises. It sounds like people screaming. Maybe I’m being paranoid but now I wish he hadn’t left me in charge of something so important. I want a peaceful night’s rest for once. Yeah, I’ll tell him! And if he don’t find someone else to hire and take my place, then I’m outta here!”_  
  
Audrey frowned. The mention of a machine nagged at her. It felt important. Unfortunately, none of the other recordings she had come across so far said anything about a machine. They mainly spoke of their own individual problems, and occasionally a sense of frustration or unease, but nothing that interested her as much as that particular one.  
  
Audrey puzzled over it all, skirting around an ink puddle resting in the middle of the floor. It moved. She barely caught it, out of the corner of her eye. “Whuh–?” She only got that out before the cold substance wrapped around her ankle, tripping her. Audrey threw her arms out, grunting as she hit the floor, but the fall muffled by her fast reflexes.  
  
Audrey looked over her shoulder and gaped as a humanoid ink being slowly rose up from the puddle of ink. Even without eyes it managed to glare at her as its grip on her ankle tightened.  
  
“Let go!” She kicked out. The heel of her boot hit the creature square in the face. It recoiled, groaning in surprise, and its grip on her loosened. She pulled away and scrambled to her feet, backing up as the ink being crawled towards her.  
  
Audrey needed no more motivation to turn tail and run. Whatever that thing was, it was out for blood. She wasn’t about to stick around.  
  
The tight corners made it easy for her to lose the thing. She leaned against a wall, panting and listening. She could hear it grumbling from far away. But she refused to relax until it moved and she couldn’t hear it anymore. Her heartbeat echoed in her ears.  
  
What was that? It looked like a misshapen person sculpted from ink, similar to the one imprisoned in the other cage in the room she woke up in. But they were vastly different. Whereas the caged one had looked human in stature, except for its glowing eyes and the ink drooping over its mouth, this creature had no legs, but it had long arms that it used to drag itself along the floor. Its body was bulbous and fluid, hunched in an arc, and its face was squashed and only barely resembled the intricacies of a human face. Yet it clearly expressed anger and frustration.  
  
“Just what is going on?” she wondered out loud.  
  
Audrey glanced around, taking stock of her surroundings. The only difference in this area was the message written on the wall, in bigger handwriting than before.  
  
 **Dreams Come True.**  
  
“Dreams come true?” She approached the writing, raising her hand to trail her fingers down the bold letters. A man's voice echoed in her head, vague and distant, like someone calling from across a deep wide cavern, miles and miles away. “Who wrote this?”  
  
The response she received was a sudden whack to the head. Her vision shuddered as she collapsed to the floor. As the world turned dark, Audrey managed to turn her head just enough to see a woman staring down at her, holding a sword in her right hand and a pipe in her left.  
  
“Who…?”  
  
Audrey blacked out.


	2. Angel

Was she in heaven? Audrey wondered. There was an angel standing over her. She blinked. The angel turned into the woman who knocked her out.

"Gah!" Audrey's reflexes kicked in and she scooted backwards, only to hit her head on a wall, in the same spot the pipe had hit her. She grimaced and rubbed the spot, then glared at the woman. "Who are you?" she demanded. "Why did you hit me?"

"I don't know if you noticed, but this place is crawling with monsters who wouldn't hesitate to kill you at a moment's notice. I couldn't take the chance that you weren't like them." Her voice was warm, melodic even, but betrayed a hint of sarcasm that irritated Audrey.

"Monsters?" she said. "Like that thing that grabbed me?"

The woman quirked a brow. "You haven't been around for long, have you?"

"A little over an hour, give or take, before you knocked me out." Audrey glanced around the room. She was sitting on the floor, back against a wall, in a small room. There was a kitchen to her left that took up a quarter of the space, a couple of hammocks against the opposite wall, and a door to her right. Nothing else. It looked like whoever lived here (the woman and someone else, based on the number of hammocks) had done their best to make the place seem homely, but there wasn't much room to work with. 

"If you are looking for a weapon--say a pipe, for instance--I threw that away before I dragged you here. Other than my sword, there's nothing in here that you can use against me."

Her sword was in her hand, tightly gripped by a gloved hand. No, her hand wasn't gloved; neither of them were. Upon closer inspection, Audrey saw that the woman's hands and lower arms were coated in ink to resemble gloves. The woman, overall, had the same tones as the studio did, sepia and black. Her hair was long and tied back into a ponytail. Two horns poked out of her hair. Audrey blinked, again. No, the horns were still there. She wasn't hallucinating.

"Are those...horns?" she asked.

"Yes. Got a problem?" The woman tensed up.

"No," she said quickly. "Being knocked out and kidnapped, however, I do have a problem with."

The woman shrugged. "As I said, I don't know who you are. I don't know what sort of a threat you pose."

"And like you ever so cleverly deduced earlier, I haven't been awake for long, so I can't be that much of a threat. I don't know where I am or who you are or what the heck is going on. All I know is my name, but a fat load of help that is."

The woman's eyes widened. "You know your name?"

"Yeah," Audrey said, crossing her arms.

"Tell me it!"

"Why should I?" she demanded, more than slightly put off by the woman's sudden enthusiasm.

"Most people down here don't remember their names. I don't. But I've been called Alice before. I don't know why. I've decided to stick with it for now."

"It sounds to me like you're only a little less lost than I am," Audrey said.

Alice laughed bitterly. "Lost is the best term to describe everyone down here."

A sense of hopelessness was beginning to settle in her gut. From what Alice (or whoever she was, really) was saying, Audrey wasn't the only one with missing memories. How was that possible? How could so many people not remember who they are, who they once were? Did it have to do with this building? Did it effect them, somehow?

"Is there anything you can tell me about this place?" Audrey asked. She didn't expect much of an answer, but she needed to hear what the other woman had to say. "You might not know much, but it's more than I do."

"Hmm. I suppose it's safe to tell you...but first, give me your name."

Audrey relented with a sigh. "It's Audrey."

A flash of...something passed over Alice's eyes, but it disappeared just as quickly. "Audrey..." she muttered, looking away. "I think I've heard that name before. I can't remember..."

"You think you used to know me?" Audrey sat up eagerly.

"I think...I don't know for sure." She looked back at Audrey. "This is the first flash of recognition I've had since waking up in this hellhole. That must mean something. _You_ must mean something to me. It frustrates me not being able to remember."

"I get that."

Alice was silent for about a minute. Audrey decided not to press her, instead allowing her to take her time to reply to her earlier question. At last, Alice spoke.

"From what I've gathered about this place, it used to be a workshop of sorts. A studio, that made cartoons. I know that sounds silly, but all the evidence points to that, from the recordings I found to the posters littering the walls. It would explain all the ink, but it doesn't explain what happened to this place. Not exactly. But there is this...machine."

"A machine?"

Alice frowned at her. "You know of it?" she asked, looking suspicious.

"Only from a recording. I heard a few of those before we...met. Only one of them held anything interesting. It was made by a man who was complaining about being left in charge of a machine. He said it made all these weird, creepy noises, and that ever since he started managing it he'd been getting these nightmares."

"Makes sense. The Machine makes nightmares all the time. It made me and it made Tom. It made you and it made that monster you saw. All of us come from the Machine."

"What does it do, exactly?" Audrey perked up now that they were making some headway. She was right; the Machine was important. It seemed to be at the center of this whole mess.

"I just told you," Alice replied. "It makes nightmares and then some. It's connected to every room in the studio through interlocking pipes. It gave us life and fuels... _him_."

"Him?" Audrey asked.

Alice shuddered. "Pray you never meet him, but you'll see his face all over the studio. The grin is unmistakable."

Now Audrey had even more questions; she was beginning to feel overwhelmed.

"Who is he?" she asked. "Is he worse than what I saw out there?"

"Audrey, you haven't seen anything yet." A loud knock at the door interrupted Alice from continuing and caused both of them to jump. Audrey tensed up, expecting something to break down the door and attack them. Instead a series of knocks echoed through; a pattern. Alice's face lit up. "Tom!" she exclaimed, and rushed over to unbolt the door. Audrey hadn't even noticed the door was bolted. Alice flung it open.

A cartoon wolf entered the room, wearing suspenders and carrying a bag full of miscellaneous items on his back. He wore boots and was standing on both of his feet; instead of front paws, he had gloved hands--well, one gloved hand, which was currently clutching a bleeding stump where a left arm should have been.

Audrey would have started questioning her sanity right there and then if she hadn't already heard and witnessed some already bizarre things. Still, a cartoon wolf? Not only were they trapped in an old animation studio, but there was an actual, real cartoon standing not ten feet away from her?

_Sure, why not?_

"Tom!" Alice fretted over his loss of an arm. "What happened? What did this?"

The wolf, Tom, made a scowling face and growled a little. Alice apparently knew what that meant, because her face paled.

"The Ink Demon? Tom, I told you to watch out for him. You're lucky you only lost an arm."

Ink Demon? Was that who Alice had been trying to warn her about?

She didn't get the chance to ask, as Tom suddenly saw her and stepped back, assuming a defensive stance and shooting a questioning look at Alice.

"She's not a threat to us, Tom. At least, she hasn't shown to be one yet. She only just woke up recently. She's just as confused as we are." To think that Alice thought that much of Audrey, she never would have guessed. Tom, however, looked skeptical, and urgent about something else entirely, as he was gesturing at Alice with his one good hand, and pointing outside.

"What are you saying, Tom? I'm sorry, I'm still trying to understand your lingo...and you're arm..." She reached out a hand, but he batted it away and pointed again. Her eyes widened with understanding. "Oh, the Ink Demon, he's on his way here?!"

Tom nodded.

"Okay. Okay, we can deal with this. We just have to not panic." It was hard to tell if she was speaking more to Tom or herself. "Right. Let's put a quick bandage on your arm, then we'll get out of here, find a new place to hideout."

"What's going on?" Audrey asked, standing up as Alice dug some bandages out of a cabinet in the kitchen area. "Who's the Ink Demon? Why is he after you?"

"He's the big threat I was starting to tell you about," Alice explained, half-distracted by applying the bandages to Tom's wound. "Everyone fears him. But there's no time to talk. We have to move, now." She finished up with Tom's arm and grabbed a bag she'd hidden within another cabinet. "Come on," she said, and left the room. Bewildered, Audrey started to follow, but was stopped by Tom. He stepped in front of her, growling a warning.

"Hey, I'm not a threat," Audrey protested, putting her hands up. "I don't know what's going on, but I'm not the enemy here."

Tom refused to move, standing his ground.

"Tom, stop being stubborn for once! I think we can trust her."

He huffed and turned to Alice, giving her a look.

"Yes, I know thinking and knowing are two entirely different things, but now is not the time to argue."

Tom finally relented, but he pointed two of fingers at himself, than at Audrey, then back to himself. _I'm watching you._

"Heard you loud and clear," Audrey muttered, following Tom out of the room and into a dark inky hallway. Posters lined the walls. On them were various cartoon characters. A wolf named Boris, who looked suspiciously like Tom; no, there were a few differences, like Tom's seemingly permanent scowl, whereas the wolf in the poster was either smiling or worried about something. There were a few subtle differences as well, like the shape of the eyes and the ears. There was also a fallen angel character named Alice Angel, who seemed to be a singer of sorts. She stood on a bed of clouds. Audrey paused before this one. This must be where Alice got her name, from this character. They did look a bit alike, but not enough to be confused for the same person.

Then there was a character with a bright grin that seemed to be everywhere. A little devil darling by the name of Bendy. _The Ink Demon. Is this him? But he's a cartoon character, and he's all small and round. How could he be a threat?_

Tom nudged her forward not-so-gently, nearly making her trip.

"Okay, I'm going," she said, resisting the urge to scowl.

Their footsteps echoed on the metal floor. Ink dripped quietly. Otherwise, it was completely silent. A creeping feeling of being watched began crawling over Audrey. She glanced to her right and nearly jumped. There was a life-sized cutout of the character Bendy leering at her from the corner. Okay, so maybe that smile was a little creepy.

"Where are we going?" she whispered.

Tom shushed her. A scuttling sound was coming from the adjoining hallway, which ran perpendicular to the one they were traveling. Both Tom and Alice stopped, prompting Audrey to copy them. A shadow was flickering along the wall. Alice moved backwards into the shadows; Tom grabbed Audrey's elbow, pulling her with him.

The owner of the shadow appeared, and Audrey barely withheld a gasp. It was another cartoon-looking-thing, but it was all wrong. Its mouth was stitched shut, and another one snapped open and closed on top of its head. It had three arms, two on the right side and one on the left. The one on the left had some sort of metal contraption attached to it. One of its eyes was pie-cut, but the other was eerily human and strapped to the face by a leather device.

What happened to it? Audrey suddenly felt pity towards the creature. It looked like it was in pain.

She glanced at Tom and Alice, who were looking at it with fear and disgust. She frowned. They were understandably fearful, but why? It was just keeping to itself, wandering aimlessly and not even looking at them. Then again, they were hidden in the shadows.

When it disappeared, only then did the other two relax. Tom let go of Audrey, who turned to them.

"What was that? It looked like...a cartoon."

"There are lots of those," Alice explained, "but don't be fooled. They are very dangerous. They attack anyone who gets near."

Audrey frowned again. "But it looked like it was in pain."

"Audrey." Alice put a hand on Audrey's shoulder and met her eyes. "Tom and I have been around longer. We know what we're doing. I understand that you're confused and have many questions, but please trust us."

"I do," she said. But only because they hadn't attacked her yet. To be honest, she didn't know what she felt about these two. Tom obviously did not like her, and would rather leave her for dead if it wasn't for Alice's persuasion. Alice, however, while she had knocked Audrey out earlier, her reasoning was understandable. And she vouched for Audrey, and was letting her go along with them. She wasn't so bad then, Audrey supposed.

"Come on," Alice said, pulling away. "It's not safe to stay in one place for so long."

Nothing was safe down here, Audrey thought as she followed after them. But if nothing was safe, then why were they unwilling to provide her with a weapon? Maybe she needed to prove her trustworthiness to them, as much as they needed to her.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> *I know, I know, Allison isn't Alice. But for now that's her name, as that's what the studio's denizens refer to her as. That may change in the future ;)*


End file.
